Call 12: A good cause...but a questionable donation

Breast Cancer Action says donors should ask four critical questions before giving to any breast-cancer cause:

1) Does any money from a purchase go to support a breast-cancer cause? If so, how much? What organization will get the money?

2) What will it do with the funds, and how will it turn the tide of the breast-cancer epidemic?

3) Is there a cap on the amount the company will donate? Has this maximum donation been met?

4) Does this purchase put you or someone you love at risk for exposure to toxins linked to breast cancer?

By Robert AnglenThe Republic | azcentral.comMon Dec 3, 2012 3:39 PM

An out-of-state company using the name Boobies Rock! has been hiring T-shirt-clad models to hit up patrons at Arizona bars and sporting events for “breast-cancer awareness” donations.

The women raised thousands of dollars nightly as they circulated at the Westgate, Santisi Brothers Pizzeria and Sports Grill, Cadillac Ranch and other venues, swapping T-shirts, bracelets and drink koozies for cash.

Now, some of the models are saying they were made to trick people into thinking the money was going to help breast-cancer patients instead of a for-profit enterprise. Former Boobies Rock! employees say they were provided scripts that implied donations would be used directly for patient relief rather than cancer research.

Melonie Murray of Scottsdale, a former manager who employed up to a dozen models to solicit donations, says she discovered the majority of cash was funneled into the accounts of a 33-year-old Colorado entrepreneur who operates Boobies Rock! campaigns in more than a dozen cities from Chicago to Huntington Beach, Calif.

“I feel terrible. I’m embarrassed. I was misled. I misled other people. (Business owners) let me into their bars to mislead their patrons,” Murray said. “It makes me sick that I raised money for Boobies Rock!”

The case underscores the lack of scrutiny many donors give to companies and non-profit causes before opening their wallets. That means unscrupulous operators are able to trade on diseases and charitable work without disclosing where money actually goes and who benefits.

With pink-ribbon campaigns and races for the cure driving national awareness, breast cancer has become a big business for fraud. Reports about corrupt charities, fake fundraisers and questionable marketing in the name of breast-cancer research frequently make headlines and have prompted consumer advocates to urge extra caution when donating.

One breast-cancer watchdog group in San Francisco operates a campaign called Think Before You Pink.

Boobies Rock! founder Adam Shryock did not return calls seeking comment. In an interview last week with KUSA-TV, a Gannett station in Denver, he denied wrongdoing.

“You are giving to a company that is an advocate of breast-cancer awareness, but it is a for-profit business,” Shryock said.

Shryock, who has history of creditor lawsuits and was indicted on criminal-theft charges in 2008, blamed misrepresentations on models hired to solicit donations.

“When they’re out there saying false information, it comes back on me,” Shryock told KUSA. “For the most part, it is not a problem. But it does happen from time to time.”

Lucrative business

Boobies Rock! models worked booze-fueled crowds at Arizona bars and sporting events armed with credit-card readers and money bags to collect donations. The models were friendly, patrons were having fun. And it wasn’t as if they asked for a lot of money.

Anyone making a $5 donation got a Boobies Rock! bracelet; $10 got you a koozie; $20 a T-shirt. Murray said her team could pull in more than $2,000 a night.

“We all thought it was for a great cause,” said Murray, who quit Boobies Rock! two months ago.

Murray said all the models were trained on a script that laid out specific responses for questions about where the money would go. She said the script referred to several cancer groups by name.

Models were paid $25 per hour with bonuses based on hitting goals, which could easily be met on game days at bars and restaurants around Chase Field or Jobing.com Arena.

As manager, Murray kept the books and was required to deposit proceeds weekly into a local Wells Fargo account in the name of Boobies Rock! Murray said she never thought to question the business until one of her models asked what specific percentage of the donations were going to breast-cancer groups.

“They told us it wasn’t a percentage, it was a portion,” Murray said. “It wasn’t an answer.”

Last week, Murray posted an apology on her Boobies Rock! Arizona Facebook page, saying she had no idea most of the money raised was not going for breast-cancer causes.

“I will be reaching out to all of the businesses personally who allowed me to bring my team into their place of business to take advantage, unknowingly, of their patrons,” Murray said.

Her apology came a day after another former Boobies Rock! employee told the Chicago Sun-Times that she suspected the company was playing on people’s sympathy for breast-cancer causes, prompting an inquiry by the Illinois Attorney General’s Office.

Jessica Thompson, 33, told the newspaper that she answered a Craigslist ad looking for models to do event promotions at Chicago Bears football games and other events.

Thompson said that she and other models were instructed by a trainer never to use the word “sell” but to explicitly say they were seeking donations for breast-cancer awareness.

In an interview with Call 12 for Action last week, Thompson said she initially thought the company was a legitimate charity but became suspicious when her trainer talked of flying bags of cash from Chicago to Denver.

Thompson said she quit in October and posted a question on her Facebook page asking whether Boobies Rock! was engaged in fraud. She said the company responded with a terse and threatening letter accusing her of slander.

“I took their e-mail and cut-and-pasted it onto Facebook,” Thompson said, adding that she was first frightened but later became angry.

Within days, she received a two-page cease-and desist letter letter from a Boobies Rock! lawyer: “Your actions are harmful to the reputation of Boobies Rock! You have falsely accused the corporation of perpetrating a scam on the public.”

Instead of backing down, Thompson went to the Sun-Times.

“I did this because I believe in the cause,” Thompson said. “Girls are being told the money is going to help cancer. It’s the exact opposite.”

Since the Sun-Times report, Thompson said, she has been contacted by other Boobies Rock! employees in Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee, all raising questions about the company.

Company formed in 2010

On its website, Boobies Rock! describes itself as a leading advocate for breast-cancer awareness in the United States.

“Our mission is simple; to create awareness through fun, fashionable and humorous clothing and accessories,” the website states. “Boobies Rock! donates only to organizations that provide direct funds and relief to active patients and survivors.”

The website specifically states that “a portion of each online sale” is donated to various breast-cancer organizations but makes no mention of the donations raised by models.

Boobies Rock! was formed in 2010 and operates under the Se7ven Group, a San Francisco advertising company Shryock owns.

Court records show Shryock is no stranger to lawsuits and neither is Boobies Rock! He racked up judgments in California, Texas and Kansas before moving to Castle Rock, Colo., last year.

He was hit with a $2,700 small-claims court judgment in California last year. Creditors successfully sued him four other times between 2006 and 2009 for about $72,000.

Records show that Shryock was indicted in 2008 on charges of writing a bad check to a party-planning service. The amount of the check was less than $20,000, according to records. The case’s disposition is unclear.

Shryock also faced a misdemeanor charge in Glendale for operating without a license in 2010. The charge was dismissed.

Shryock told KUSA-TV that his company has made millions of dollars and has donated about $325,000 to eight charities.

“We give a tremendous amount of money,” Shryock said.

But records show the bulk of the company’s donations came as the result of lawsuits against Boobies Rock!, including a $250,000 settlement last year with the California-based Keep A Breast Foundation. It accused Shryock of marketing counterfeit bracelets and apparel bearing the foundation’s slogan “I Love Boobies.”

The only donation listed on the Boobies Rock! website is $25,000 to the Young Survival Coalition. That donation was actually part of the $250,000 settlement with Keep A Breast.

Keep A Breast designated Young Survival Coalition to receive the payout from Shryock as a way to ensure “ill-gotten funds were donated, as promised, to breast-cancer charities,” the foundation said in a news release about the settlement. Shryock also had to forfeit about $200,000 in what the foundation called counterfeit merchandise.

The Sun-Times documented instances where Boobies Rock! claimed to be affiliated with cancer organizations that received only nominal funds from the company. One got $100 and another got $250 after officials said they confronted Shryock.

“We’re not saying do not donate to breast cancer. We’re saying there are critical questions that need to be asked,” said Karuna Jaggar, executive director of Breast Cancer Action, a grass-roots agency that monitors fraud, waste and scams involving breast cancer.

In 2002, Breast Cancer Action launched its ongoing Think Before You Pink campaign in response to an overwhelming number of unregulated and unchecked pink-ribbon-marketing efforts.

In addition to outright fraud, Jaggar said, some companies will stick pink ribbons on products as a way to “promote awareness” without contributing a dime to any cause.

Other companies use breast-cancer awareness to sell products that actually can put people at risk for breast-cancer, she said.

Despite the proliferation of cases involving breast-cancer fraud, Jaggar says the public is becoming more attuned to deceptive practices.

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